Technical Field
The subject matter described herein generally relates to the field of predicting and managing catastrophic event impacts, and more specifically to modeling scenarios involving one or more catastrophic events and making decisions regarding mitigation accordingly.
Background Information
Numerous resources need to be deployed when disasters strike. Fire, police, National Guard and FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) resources all need to be allocated in a sensible manner. For some disasters, coordination among two or more national governments may be required. Likewise, businesses need to allocate their resources in a similar fashion. For instance, if a retail establishment has a regional warehouse, it will want to know which stores are likely to be damaged (so goods are not shipped there) as well as which are nearby to the impacted area but are not likely to be damaged (so that goods can be shipped there to be available in the damaged area after the disaster).
Perhaps the most direct example of such allocation of resources in the face of a catastrophic event comes from the insurance industry. In that industry, multiple layers of insurers have often-overlapping coverage, all with limits (e.g., caps) and other constraints. Further, catastrophic events, even if randomly distributed, are sometimes bunched so that exposure seems unusually high. In addition, some catastrophic events tend not to be independent but instead are tied together, e.g., (a) a weather pattern breeds multiple cyclonic events during a single season; (b) a large earthquake is accompanied by a tsunami and numerous aftershocks; (c) a terrorist attack is not isolated but is planned as one of several coordinated attacks.
In the past, governments, aid organizations and businesses have come up with documents outlining certain “rules of engagement” with respect to addressing the impact of such catastrophic events. For example, a state National Guard unit may have one plan for mobilization within the state's boundaries, but a more complex and limited manner of engagement for mobilization when a neighboring state seeks its assistance.
As such rules and agreements play out, however, the complexity becomes quite difficult to manage. For instance, there is widespread public commentary regarding the number of different law enforcement agencies with jurisdiction in Washington, DC. The FEMA website page http://www.fema.gov/about/offices/ncr/index.shtm explains that there is an entire Office of National Capital Region Coordination to oversee and manage the overlapping responsibilities of various authorities in the region who should be included in catastrophic planning.
In the private sector, various responsibilities for addressing damage due to catastrophic events are typically spelled out in contracts. Allocating risks and responsibilities related to such events is a difficult task, and accuracy in prediction of needs can be quite beneficial, for example in determining the amount and location of emergency supplies to warehouse in various locations.
It would be advantageous to such allocation tasks if there were a system and method that could accurately model disaster event scenarios in a manner that did not consume excessive computational resources.
The features and advantages described in the specification are not all inclusive and, in particular, many additional features and advantages will be apparent to one of ordinary skill in the art in view of the drawings, specification, and claims. Moreover, it should be noted that the language used in the specification has been principally selected for readability and instructional purposes, and may not have been selected to delineate or circumscribe the disclosed subject matter.
The figures depict various embodiments for purposes of illustration only. One skilled in the art will readily recognize from the following discussion that alternative embodiments of the structures and methods illustrated herein may be employed without departing from the principles of the invention described herein.